The Supreme Court of New South Wales has recently handed down its decision in proceedings (“Arrium Proceedings”) brought by a number of lenders against former officers and employees of Arrium Limited and its subsidiaries (“Arrium”).
Introduction
Justice Ball’s landmark decision1 dismissing the lenders’ claims addressed various important issues that often arise when a borrower is facing financial distress in Australia, including:
On the 2 August 2021 Treasury released a consultation paper titled ‘Helping Companies Restructure by Improving Schemes of Arrangement. The consultation is aimed at reforming Australia’s scheme of arrangement procedure.
Insolvency relief extended to 31 December 2020
On Sunday, the Federal Government announced that it will extend until the end of the year insolvency relief measures which were put in place from March 2020 as part of its response to the COVID-19 pandemic which were due to expire on 25 September 2020.[1]
The Australian Government has introduced new laws which are intended to avoid unnecessary corporate insolvencies in light of the challenges presented by the unfolding COVID-19 global pandemic. The new laws came into effect on 25 March 2020 and include:
For some time now, there has been uncertainty in Australian insolvency law about whether or not insolvency practitioners should apply the statutory priority regimes established by sections 433, 566 and 561 of the Corporations Act 2001 (Cth) when distributing the assets of a “trading trust”. The decision of the New South Wales Supreme Court in Re Independent Contractor Services (Aust) Pty Ltd (In liq) [No 2] (2016) 305 FLR 222, and the myriad of cases that followed it, suggested that the answer was “no”.
In July 2017, we wrote about the case of Hamersley Iron Pty Ltd v Forge Group Power Pty Ltd (in liquidation) (receivers and managers appointed)[1], in which the Western Australian Supreme Court held that rights of set off enjoyed by an insolvent company’s contractual counterparties would not apply if the company had granted a security interest over the relevant contractual righ
The special purpose liquidators of Queensland Nickel Pty Ltd (in liq) have been successful in their application in the Supreme Court of Queensland for freezing orders against Mr Clive Palmer and several companies which he controls.[1]
Background
In our previous blog post, we examined the decision of the New South Wales Court of Appeal to uphold the composition of classes of creditors in the Boart Longyear restructuring by way of scheme of arrangement.
In the recent case of Hamersley Iron Pty Ltd v Forge Group Power Pty Ltd (in liquidation) (receivers and managers appointed)[1], the Western Australian Supreme Court has confirmed that the grant of a security interest under the Personal Property Securities Act 2009 (PPSA) by a company to a third party will likely render any rights of set-off enjoyed by the company’s contractual counterparties worthless where the company subs
In one of the most significant decisions relating to schemes of arrangement in Australia in recent years, the New South Wales Court of Appeal has dismissed an appeal challenging the composition of classes of creditors in the Boart Longyear restructuring.